The human experience of flavor, of tasting and eating, uses all of our senses.  We interact with our food using every sensory mechanism in our body: most of us hear, see, feel, smell, and taste food when we eat.  In this mediation, I invite you to engage your senses fully and mindfully by consuming a spoonful of something sweet.

To complete this meditation, you will require:

One spoon

One spoonful of a sweet substance of your choice, including but not limited to:

• Honey
• Maple Syrup
• Artificial Sweetener
• Sugar

The substance should taste almost exclusively of sweetness, rather than any other taste (i.e. not a fruit or ice cream).

 

Listen to the 4-minute meditation here:

 

If you’d rather read the text, here it is:

Fill the spoon with the sweet and hold it in front of you. Consider the shape of the spoon handle, the depth of the bowl, the material of the spoon and its color. Shift the spoon slightly, and notice how the light hits the spoon and your sweet within it.  Notice the color of your sweet, the consistency and texture.  Imagine putting the spoon in your mouth, imagine tasting it.  How will the spoon feel against your tongue? What texture will the sweet feel like in your mouth? What will it taste like?

Sniff the spoonful.  What can you smell? What other smells are in the room around you? Breathe in and think about what sweetness smells like.

Bring the spoon to your lips, and taste the sweet.  Notice how you just tasted it – did you swallow all in one bite? Did you flick your tongue to barely sample it? Did you feel the spoon and sweet against your lips?  Why did you taste it this way?

If it’s comfortable, leave the sweet in your mouth for a while and move it around. What can you feel on your tongue or the side of your cheek? Are you salivating? Does your mouth feel dry? Say aloud as many adjectives to describe the experience of eating the sweet as you can think of (describing flavor, texture, emotion, memory, etc).

Take another taste, and notice the spoon on your tongue or the roof of your mouth.  How does the particular spoon that you chose (especially its material) influence your taste experience? 

Can you smell the sweet while it’s on your tongue?

How does your throat feel? Your stomach?

Does this sweet evoke any memories for you? Do you have a story to tell about it?

If you have any more sweet left, finish it off, and consider how having eaten this sweet mindfully feels in your body.